


Watercolor Bouquet

by Masu_Trout



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Canonical Character Death, F/F, Femslash February, Grief/Mourning, POV First Person, Post-Canon, Retrospective, Team Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-10
Updated: 2016-02-10
Packaged: 2018-05-19 10:59:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5964808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Masu_Trout/pseuds/Masu_Trout
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The hardest thing about loss is that it's so very <i>sudden</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Watercolor Bouquet

When Aerith died I was sick for days. I cried until I couldn’t anymore, watched Cloud lay her to rest in the water, then got up and packed my things and went chasing Sephiroth with the rest of them. All the while my stomach was trying to tear its way out of me and my hands wouldn’t stop shaking no matter what I did—I remember forcing them flat against the wall of one of the Ancient’s buildings, trying to hold them steady, and watching as they jittered and jerked against the stone like I was being electrocuted.

At first I thought I was going crazy, and then I thought maybe I was dying too. I went a little weird for a while after, between the grief and the dehydration and the thing where I couldn’t sleep without seeing her blood splattering out against the cobbles all over again. I remember thinking that maybe Aerith was trying to kill me, that maybe this was happening because she wanted to take me with her. 

I remember being pretty excited about that, actually. I remember feeling glad that she didn’t mean to leave me behind.

Like I said. _Weird_.

It was hard because I’d never had to deal with this sort of loss before. I didn’t realize it at the time, but pretty much everyone but me had knew how this felt already. Cloud and Tifa had their village, Barret had his, Nanaki had his mom, Vincent had Lucrecia, and Cid hardly ever talked about it but I’m sure he saw a shit-ton of his people get stabbed or shot or blown up during the war.

(Reeve, I don’t know—I hardly ever talk to the guy. Honestly, I prefer Cait Sith. That sounds ridiculous, and I guess it’s sort of like saying I like his right arm better than his left, but it’s true. I can’t imagine Reeve _not_ having some sort of damage, though; you don’t end up the way he is without something massively fucked-up happen in your life. It’s just not possible.)

I mean, yeah, there was my father. But my father wasn’t dead at the time, just dying. He’d been dying by inches for as long as I could remember, and so I’d had my time to grieve and rage and plead while he was still (marginally) there.

With Aerith it was different. She’d been with us one moment—I remember, I’d seen the smile on her face as she prayed—and then suddenly nothing. Just a husk, wearing her skin and her clothes but with nothing of what I’d loved about her left.

And I did love her. I mean, we all loved her, everyone loved her, but I really loved her. I was sixteen and stupid and thought I could fix the world with my fists and my shuriken, but I really did love her. I’ve never met anyone like Aerith before or since—she knew the name of every plant from Midgar to Mideel, and I once saw her ram her staff _through_ a bagnadrana and out the other side. She fought like she wanted to win, not because she liked killing things but because she knew we’d be destroyed if we lost.

You don’t replace a person like that. You just get back up and keep moving, and hope that the hole she left will someday feel less raw to the touch. 

I plant flowers for her every year, on the anniversary of her death. And what the empress does, the people follow: the hills of Wutai are covered with pink and red and gold. I think it’s something she’d like—I hope she appreciates it, wherever she is in the Lifestream now.

No one will ever read this. Or, if someone does, it won’t be until long after I’ve already passed into legend, carved into stone like the emperors before me. So I feel safe in saying this:

I miss you, Aerith, even now. I always will. And when I see you again—whether it’s tomorrow or in ten years or when I’m grey-haired and eighty—I’ll run right to you and tell you everything I should have told you before.

**Author's Note:**

> This is mostly an attempt to experiment some with POV—I'm not quite sure how it turned out overall, but at the very least it was fun to write!


End file.
